When Jeff Dolch goes out to change the gas price sign at his BP Amoco station, drivers passing by often roll down the window to ask if the numbers are going up or down. Lately, the answer is always the same: Prices are rising.
"I wear a bulletproof vest," Dolch joked yesterday.
The gas price sign has been around for generations, calling drivers off the road to fill up their tanks for $1, then $2 and now more than $2.50 a gallon. And as the summer's volatile gas prices continue to rise, station owners such as Dolch are changing the signs more often, posting the higher numbers that make many motorists cringe.
Gas prices in Maryland are 70 cents a gallon higher than they were this time last year, said Ragina Averella, a spokeswoman at AAA Mid-Atlantic. Maryland gas prices jumped 10 cents over the weekend, and another 5 cents by yesterday, Averella said.
Yesterday's average gas price was $2.58 in Maryland and $2.52 nationwide, she said.
Dolch, who owns the BP Amoco station at St. Paul Street and Mount Royal Avenue in Baltimore, already has raised his price six times this month - once by 6 cents a gallon. That compares with five price changes at his station in May and five in June.
Last month, his prices changed seven times, but some of those were decreases, he said.
Falling prices, however, are a distant memory and Dolch said his customers are growing more concerned.
"I think people are worried," he said. "How far is it going to go?"
Dolch said his business has not decreased in response to the higher price. But 40 percent of consumers will switch the station they use for a 3-cent-per-gallon savings, according to a 2002 study by the National Association of Convenience Stores.
Between losing customers and fees gas stations must pay to the credit-card companies for their services, retailers aren't benefiting from the high gas prices, said Jeff Lenard, a spokesman for the association. He added that retailers are receiving an inordinate amount of abuse - from customers grumbling at the pump and inside the stores to gasoline theft - for the higher prices.
"I don't think anybody in the industry is happy by these high prices," Lenard said, "least of all those guys changing the signs."
Bob Valentin had to report to work last weekend just to deliver the bad news to his customers: Gas prices at his station had gone up, and, metal pole in hand, Valentin had to change the numbers on the sign.
